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While I was quaffing a rather nice glass of red wine at the local bar, I spotted a leaflet advertising an English Summer Camp, the experience of losing their kids for one week cost the parents the princely sum of €550.

Wine and chocolate food aids the brain cells

I will be honest, the summer camp leaflet and time table didn’t inspire me. As the smooth red wine stimulated my brain cells, I suddenly had a cunning plan.

Maybe I could run an English Summer Camp

Camping English Style

Obviously I can’t guarantee the traditional English weather.

I have an American friend who was an English teacher and more importantly she owns a vineyard, who better to team up with?

Over a cappuccino (I know it should have been a glass of wine) I told her about my cunning plan, I explained that I teach seven classes of kids ranging from six to eleven years of age. And if we talk to the parent we should have enough kids to fill the camp. I also mentioned the kids we could veto, for example the class clown in year 3 and little Marco who always has his finger buried up his nose to his first knuckle.

Marco the nose picker

My American friend disagreed, she said these are precisely the kids we should invite…

In the interest of research I sent a message to Linda Von Grady at Expat Eye on Germany to ask her opinion and she replied “Ha, why do you do these things to your self?”

My only excuse is the wine motivated me.

So in a little over three and a half months, twenty two Italian nose picking kids will descend on a vineyard for 6 days and 6 nights in a hope to improve their English and have a great and spiffing time.

And if we survive the encounter, another twenty two kids will arrive the following week.

I hate to tell you but TNT Express are as bad if not worse than Fedex. Mind you I have just found out they are now part of the same organisation run by David Binks their CEO. I did write to Mr Binks, but he didn’t reply to me nor did his organisation answer my questions.

So here we go… a little story book for you.

I am sorry this is not as funny as my usual posts, but I am still a tad disappointed with TNT

All the best Pecora Nera

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A couple of months back, Mrs Sensible was poorly sick and dying and horrors upon horrors, she phoned the school and told them she would not be teaching the little chilblains how to tie their shoelaces and how not to pick their noses.

No picking your nose in Mrs Sensibles classroom

I was immediately despatched to the doctors to pick up a sick note and deliver it to the school admin. I tried to protest by saying “it can wait until you are better” and “it’s flipping cold outside”.

Mrs S was having none of it, She explained that by law a teacher must submit a sick note on her first day of sickness. I was of course scoffing, tutting and raising my eyes to heaven. What if you are really really sick and your husband isn’t at home? What then, eh! Eh!

My doctors English language skills are about as good as my Italian. We can say hello, goodbye and the rest we get by with miming and a mixture of English and Italian words.

If I wasn’t so good at miming, I might have to learn the language.

The doctor wrote out the sick note and then produced a fully functioning needle and syringe, I winced as he mimed how to give the injection into the upper arm. He showed me it should be injected at a 90 deg angle, not a 45 deg or even 30 deg.

The first thing I did was made sure I was not the intended recipient of the object of torture, once I realised it was for Mrs S I started to relax.

“You like I give needle to Mrs Sensible”

“It’s not difficult, just make sure you get the angle correct”

“Today!”

“No, it is to protect her against influenza, give it to her when her cold has cleared up”

“Sorry I no understand, talk again”

“Next week”

“Oh, Ok”

The weapon of mass destruction

When I arrived home I explained to Mrs S about the syringe, I said she had to drop her knickers and bend over so I could give her the injection.

It took her a full 2.5 milliseconds to realise my bedside manner was not fully kosher, she looked at me in her school marm way and asked what the doctor really said.

I think I would make a great doctor

So I told her what the doc said, or at least what I thought he had said and then added that there was no way I was going to stab her with the needle, I don’t like receiving injections and I am not going to start giving them…

It has since been explained to me that there is always somebody in the family who is a dab hand at giving injections.

To be honest, Italy never ceases to amaze me.

PS, Why am I writing this now and not when it happened? Because I have man flu and the syringe is still sat in our fridge, waiting for an aunt or needle friendly neighbour to turn up for a coffee and DIY hospital treatment.

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I have officially started my quest for Italian Citizenship, the first step in what will no doubt be A Titanic Success, you might have noticed I have stole that particular phrase from Boris The Foreign Secretary, who regularly opens his mouth, to change feet.

The first step on my quest, was to write to Disclosure Scotland and request a copy of my criminal record. To be honest I am a little surprised at what they managed to drag up.But at least they earned their £25.00

I wonder if Sal has started her application? We were going to race each other.

Next Step, finding things like marriage certificates and birth certificates….

I know a couple of you follow this blog in the hope of reading one of Mrs Sensible’s authentic Sicilian recipes, not wanting to disappoint you I have decided to create the Pecora Nera Home Cooking Channel.

Before you try the recipe I did try it on little Mario to see what he thought and his initial thoughts were,

Please let Mrs Sensible cook next time

And Marco said

I’m sure he didn’t follow the recipe properly

So here is a link to my latest video from Pecora Nera’s home cooking channel.

For Christmas I will upload ‘ How to prepare a traditional Christmas Lunch

Christmas Lunch in a can

I was going to upload a picture of a whole Chicken in a Can, but it made me feel a little queezy and I don’t want to put you off my Spaghetti Bolognese recipe.